Abstract:  Negative partisanship describes the intense disdain for a rival political party. A growing number of political scientists in the US and beyond examine the impact of negative partisanship on citizens’ political behavior, asserting the notion that negative partisanship exerts a strong influence, either on its own or in combination with positive partisanship. Yet we know little about the psychological origins of negative and positive partisanship: Which personality traits are associated with high levels of negative partisanship, and do they differ from the ones that have been linked to positive partisanship? In this article, I address these questions. Utilizing a sample of US adults and a sample of Swedish adults, I examine the influence of prominent personality traits—including Authoritarianism, Social Dominance Orientation, the Need for Closure, and the Big Five—on strong negative and positive partisanship. I demonstrate that the personality origins of positive and negative partisanship differ not just across the two samples but also across partisans on the left and on the right. I conclude the article with implications for research on polarization and a plea for more comparative work on (positive and negative) partisanship.

Keywords:  negative partisanship; personality; positive partisanship; psychology; social identity; Sweden; US

Published:   30 December 2022

Issue:   Vol 10, No 4 (2022): Negative Politics: Leader Personality, Negative Campaigning, and the Oppositional Dynamics of Contemporary Politics